


Brain-Stealing Aliens

by FrenchRoast



Category: Animorphs - Katherine A. Applegate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-02
Updated: 2020-08-02
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:46:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25663834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrenchRoast/pseuds/FrenchRoast
Summary: After Estrid and the other Andalites leave, the Human Controllers start craving human hosts in a whole new way...
Comments: 1
Kudos: 24
Collections: Animorphs Mini Bang 2020





	Brain-Stealing Aliens

**Author's Note:**

> Set between books #38 and #40 (because #39? What #39? There was no #39...)

My name is Jake. _Je m’appelle Jake_ , I thought to myself as I set my tray of nachos on the least-dirty table I could find. You see, I had a skit to perform in French class in a few days, and that was the only line I could remember. But instead of studying and memorizing my lines for a skit that was 20% of my grade, I was in the mall food court on a Saturday, waiting for the other Animorphs to show up. Unfortunately, “I’m the leader of a band of guerilla fighters who morph into animals to fight brain-stealing alien slugs” _isn’t_ the best or most believable answer to the question “You had three weeks to work on this: why aren’t you prepared?” I sighed and silently cursed whoever had decided to put me in French for my elective instead of art or gym or really anything that didn’t require homework and/or studying to pass.

“Jake!” Rachel called out as she walked up with Cassie and a tray with fries smothered in cheese and bacon bits. “Fancy running into you here.” We still tried to pretend we ended up in the same place by chance.

“Aren’t you here every Saturday, cuz?”

“She wishes,” Marco said as he walked up. Tobias was with him. “And every store within a 20 mile radius is eagerly awaiting the day Rachel’s old enough for her own credit cards.”

“You guys want to share my table?” I offered. I beckoned them all to pull up chairs and sit with their trays. The charade was a bit ridiculous, but it was better for no one to know we were more than just classmates. Once everyone was seated, we got down to business, talking between bites of nachos and cheese fries. I hated to admit it, but it went a lot easier without Ax present, if only because there was enough food to go around and no one had to watch to make sure he didn’t eat the paper plates. Ax was still upset over the incident with Estrid and the other Andalites during our last mission. Cassie suggested he still needed some space, so I didn’t ask him to join us this time. Tobias was going to bring him a Cinnabon to-go.

“So are you going to tell us why we’re here, oh fearless leader?” Marco asked.

I nodded, and lowered my voice. “Tom’s up to something. Something big. He’s been getting a lot of Sharing-related calls, and last night I overheard him on the phone talking about a meeting that’s happening tonight.”

“That’s pretty normal for him, isn’t it?” asked Cassie.

“Not meetings for only upper level members--meetings that are being kept secret from Visser Three,” I replied. “I heard the phrase ‘human controllers only’.”

“Wait, what?” Rachel dropped the fry she’d been holding.

Cassie leaned in, almost conspiratorial. “Do you think this is it, guys? Do you think the human-controller Yeerks might rebel?”

Marco nodded slowly, turning the idea over in his head. “It’s possible,” he agreed. “Visser Three _is_ an incompetent tool with a penchant for killing his underlings. And underlings tend to not like being killed.”

“If they get rid of Visser Three, what does that mean for us?” wondered Rachel.

“It means we can win. They’ll all be divided if Visser Three isn’t around to keep them in check,” Tobias said, his voice rising with excitement.

“Or it means someone more competent will take charge,” Marco pointed out. “Someone who might speed up the infestations, or even make this an open war. Someone like my mom. Or rather, the slug inside her.”

“We can’t win an open war,” said Cassie. “Not even if we asked Toby and the free Hork-Bajir for help.”

“We’d be toast,” Marco concurred not-so-helpfully. I realized we had quickly gotten carried away.

“We don’t even know what this is, guys,” I reminded them. “There could be lots of reasons to have a secret meeting.”

“Come on, Jake. They’re not getting together to plan Visser Three’s surprise birthday party.”

“No, but—“ I was cut off by a scream. And then more screams and shouts. They were coming from the line in front of the Cinnabon.

“What the…?” Marco trailed off even as we all stood up to see what exactly was happening.

“AAAAAAAAEEEEEEE! She BIT me!” a lady standing by the counter screeched. She was pointing at a blonde girl in a pink hoodie trying to crawl over the counter as the Cinnabon staff dispersed—a couple of them ran for the back, while another jumped over the other side of the counter. Something was off about the biter. That is, something besides the fact that she’d just bitten someone. Her skin had a yellow-green cast to it. And I was certain I’d seen her before. I turned to the others.

“Something weird is going on.”

“Yeah, there’s a girl over there biting people like she’s Ax and they’re made of cinnabons,” Marco shot back.

“I think we need to get out of here, but I want eyes on her.”

Marco looked at me quizzically for a half a second, but then nodded. I started firing orders, more out of habit at this point than anything else. “Rachel, can you give us a distraction to buy some time and maybe scare people away? Marco, you go get Ax in case we need him. Tobias, you get outside and be ready to follow. Cassie and I will stay here until Rachel arrives in case anything else weird happens or we need to change plans.” The three of them were already running out as I finished talking.

“God I _really_ hope this isn’t another Andalite,” I muttered to Cassie. “Come on, we have to go help.” By now, people were mostly running away from the biter; a few people remained stubbornly in line at the restaurants on either side of the Cinnabon even as the girl landed on the other side of the counter. Cassie ran up to the lady who’d been bitten and pulled her back away from the Cinnabon counter and the girl.

“Who the hell _does_ that?” the woman demanded as if either of us had an answer to give her. “Who just bites people in the line in front of them?” Cassie shook her head and turned her attention to the wound on the lady’s upper arm. It was nasty and ragged, blood oozing. The lady with the bite began scolding the girl who’d bitten her. Before I had time to figure out what to do next, the loud roar of an angry grizzly bear shook the food court. Rachel ran towards the Cinnabon.

Anyone who’d stayed in the food court out of hunger or curiosity quickly decided to go elsewhere. People were hauling butt to get out of there. Including mall security, though I heard one guy clutching a walkie talkie report “Yes, a giant bear…how the hell am I supposed to know what kind?!” Most people were too freaked out by Rachel to even notice the biter girl was crawling back over the counter. 

“Get outside and keep eyes on the lady she bit,” I said to Cassie as I watched a mall security guy grab the biter. Even as he did so, the other mall security guy that remained began shooting wildly at Rachel until she threw a food court chair at him. He ducked; the other was dragging the writhing girl towards the nearest exit as she continued to gnash her teeth. Meanwhile, Cassie followed the blood trail of the woman who’d been bitten.

At the other end of the food court, Rachel knocked cheap food court tables this way and that. As the remaining security guy ran from the food court, Rachel flipped a stack of food trays, and roared again. Then she began knocking garbage cans over, directing her destruction away from where I stood. <You know, I think I’m going to hit up the Gap before I head out. Their new manager is a major creeper, and I think he could use a good scare,> she told me in private thought-speak. With no good way to tell her no, I turned and ran to the nearest bathroom. 

Sometimes, Rachel is just gonna Rachel.

Soon, a golden retriever came running out of the mall, following the scent of a human with a whiff of something else. I caught up to the biter in her pink hoodie outside the mall where the security guy was doing his utmost to restrain her. Most people had taken a different exit, the one Cassie and the other lady had used, but it was only a couple storefronts away, and I could see a strange look come over that lady’s face.

<Don’t let her bite you!> I yelled in private thought-speak as I bolted for Cassie. She looked up, alarmed, and began to back away. 

<Cassie, Jake, you need to head to the west, towards that patch of woods,> Tobias said from wherever he was, soaring above. The woods he was talking about were just across the street, so I bolted once the coast was clear. I could hear Cassie behind me. People were scattering all over the parking lot, and with the situation happening just outside the entrances, our exit didn’t attract attention. At most, anyone who noticed us would see a girl chasing after her loose dog.

<Cops and ambulances are coming in hot, and I think this is going to get weirder.>

<Weirder?> I said as I ducked into the trees. Cassie was further behind.

<We don’t know what this is. But from what I can see up here, that second woman just bit a man on the shoulder, and people are losing their shit. If I didn’t know better, I’d say it was…> he trailed off. 

<Rabies?> I asked hopefully.

“It’s definitely not rabies,” Cassie said as she walked up. She pet my head. I was a good dog.

 _Get a grip, Jake_ , I reminded myself. Dog morph was maybe not the best mindset for the moment, I decided, and began to demorph. I had a feeling I needed wings more anyway. 

<Why not rabies?> Marco asked as he landed on a nearby branch. A little further away, a Northern harrier found a perch. Given the distance they had to cover, I thought Rachel would easily beat Marco and Ax, but I was wrong. 

Of course, it had taken a little time for Rachel to find a good place to demorph and then morph something slightly less conspicuous than the largest bear in North America. Luckily, Fluffer McKitty blended into any cityscape, including a mall, a parking lot, or the woods adjacent to a mall parking lot. She pranced up, tail high as I finished demorphing. I decided not to ask about the manager at the Gap. 

“Rabies doesn’t spread in minutes like that,” Cassie explained.

<Prince Jake, what is going on?>

“We’re not sure.” We explained what we’d seen, but left out that it happened at the Cinnabon. I didn’t want Ax distracted about the fate of those cinnamon buns. The explanation gave me enough of a rest that I could start my bird morph.

Rachel spoke up, still in morph. <Something’s really not right. That girl smelled...wrong.>

<Wrong?> Tobias asked from a perch in the same oak tree I had landed on. <Wrong how?>

<She’s sick. The grizzly could smell it. Fluffer, too.>

<Considering she mauled a woman and would’ve mauled others and kept trying to maul that other guy, and now the person she mauled is mauling random strangers, I’d hope she’s sick. Because this is not normal,> Marco said. <This is like, Dawn of the Dead stuff.>

<She’s not a zombie, Marco,> I said. I was nearly done with my seagull morph, just waiting for my nose to turn into a beak.

<Could’ve fooled me.>

<For once, Marco might be onto something,> Rachel said. <People down there were trying to talk to both women, but nothing coherent was coming out.>

<Oh, and the first one’s definitely got a gunshot wound, and it’s not bothering her at all,> Tobias chimed in. 

I flapped out of the trees and looked at the scene by the mall entrance. Seagull sight is nothing compared to redtail sight, but it’s still good enough to see from far away. Even now, with two policemen holding her arms behind her, the pink hoodie girl was squirming to get free. Moaning and showing her teeth as she did so. The lady was similarly occupied with her own pair of cops, and there was a man in a track suit with a gaping head wound being tied down on a stretcher, three paramedics holding him down so the fourth could fasten the straps. He was writhing, teeth chomping.

It _was_ eerily zombie-like behavior. I flew back down to the others to explain what I’d seen.

“Maybe she just had too much ginger-maple oatmeal?” Cassie suggested. “A Yeerk OD?”

<Did she smell like too much ginger-maple oatmeal?>

Rachel twitched her tail. <No.>

<Is this really even our thing to deal with?> Marco asked. <I know we live and breathe the weird and insane, but maybe this is something for the CDC or the state health department. Maybe it’s not Yeerk-related at all. Maybe they can just drop her off at the nearest emergency room.>

<We’re not that lucky,> Rachel said sullenly. 

Ax ruffled his northern harrier’s feathers suddenly. <I wonder…>

<Yeah, Ax-man?>

<Forgive me for not thinking of this sooner, Prince Jake, but it is possible that not all of the prion virus Estrid engineered was destroyed when the vial Arbat was holding burned.>

Oh man. I knew what he was saying, but I didn’t want to know what he was saying. <You’re saying maybe someone got infected?>

<I am no bioengineer, certainly not someone well-versed in the plintconarhythmic physics one would need to know in order to create the quasi-virus, but Estrid said it was volatile and prone to mutation. If one particle escaped, it could theoretically have been slowly multiplying, evolving, and spreading in the Yeerk pool without notice in the weeks since our battle there. It is possible that a prion virus designed to kill Yeerks could kill the Yeerk inside without severing the physical connection to the host. Similar to the effect of the oatmeal, but with a different outward affect, and likely a different infection mechanism.>

<So...zombie plague?> Tobias said. <Huh. Suddenly being a nothlit isn’t looking so bad.>

“Are the hosts inside alive?” Cassie demanded.

<We have no way of knowing. Nor do we know if only Controllers are susceptible, or how it spreads. We do not even know if any of the persons we saw were Controllers.>

And that’s when I remembered why that blond girl was so familiar. I swore.

<Jake?>

<I just realized where I recognized that girl from. The one in the pink hoodie. She picked Tom up for a Sharing meeting a couple weeks ago! Her name’s Carrie, I think. Or Karen. Something like that.>

<This just gets better and better,> Rachel muttered. Her tail was swishing now, agitated, but I’m not sure she even realized she was doing it. 

<We need to find out if the woman she bit is a Controller, or just a regular person. Same for the guy that she bit,> Marco pointed out. 

<Rachel, Cassie, I think you both need to get some wings,> I said. <If we’re going to figure out whether or not these people are all Controllers, we’re going to need to follow the ambulances they’re being loaded into.>

*****

We split into groups--Marco and Rachel followed the ambulance the lady had been loaded into, Tobias and Cassie followed Track Suit, while Ax and I trailed after Pink Hoodie, who I was mostly sure was named Carrie.. I’d paired us off so that one of us had a seagull morph that could easily get closer, and the other had a bird of prey morph for distance and attacking, if needed. Just in case they ended up in different emergency rooms. 

It was a good precaution. It was also a nearly useless precaution; the ambulances all went to the same place.

It just wasn’t to any of our city’s hospitals.

<Uh...am I crazy, or are they not taking these people to the hospital?> Cassie asked. <And that kid’s mom didn’t even notice he dropped a half-full bag of chips. CHIPS. I love chips,> she said wistfully. I could see the chips, too. The bag was blue, and I could practically taste the cool ranch as I floated above. The bag just lay there. Open. Ripe for the taking. 

Seagull morph has its challenges. 

<They’re not taking them to the hospital. Not unless there’s a new hospital set up inside the IKEA that opened last year,> Tobias said, ignoring our chips tangent and snapping me back into focus. <Because IKEA is where they’re headed.> We watched as the ambulances descended into the parking deck. 

<I don’t think affordable furniture is going to cure this.> Marco, of course. Ever helpful. <But maybe their Swedish meatballs really are that good.>

<Let’s follow. Rachel, Cassie, come with me. Marco, Ax, Tobias, you follow too, but separately--your morphs are going to be a bit more conspicuous than our seagulls.>

The parking garage was packed. <Do this many people really need new furniture?> Cassie and I wondered aloud at the same time.

<IKEA isn’t just about furniture,> Rachel said. <It’s a shopping _experience._ >

I was going to make a sarcastic quip that would’ve made Marco proud, but I didn’t have time to formulate it, because the ambulances suddenly reached the far end of the parking garage, where a door that blended in perfectly with the cement blockwork of the wall opened. They drove through, one after the other.

<Quick! Before the door closes!>

The three of us made it, but there was no way for the others to catch up to us before it shut.

<We’ll try to find another way in!> Tobias shouted, but he was far enough behind that his thought-speak was faint. 

The ambulances didn’t go far before they turned, and the hallway opened up into a massive, warehouse-sized space full of people. Some were walking around in hazmat suits, some only had surgical masks and gloves, but most of the people we could see were strapped to hospital cots. There were at least a couple hundred people, maybe two-fifty, strapped down. 

And the awful noises they made were worse than the sight of them. There aren’t words to convey it, not really, but if you can imagine the drone of a bee hive crossed with the worse zombie movie moaning and groaning ever put on surround sound, you’ve got the beginning of an inkling of what it sounded like.

<Okay, this is bad,> Rachel said. 

<We need to find a place to hide while they’re busy unloading the people from the mall.> At the moment, we were perched on top of the last ambulance. Not the worst hiding spot, but not great. They were already starting to unload the second ambulance. The first had driven back out the doors we’d entered through.

<Do you think there’s space under the cots?> Cassie wondered. <Not that I want to get that close to these poor people, but there’s not any other furniture in here.

<I don’t think we have much choice.> They had already unloaded the first two ambulances, and the one we were on was next. It would be on its way out in another minute. <We go separately. Try to stay near each other.>

Rachel went first, then Cassie, and I was about to flutter to my own hiding space when the ambulance cranked up. There was no time, so I jumped and prayed no one saw me as I hopped under the cot they’d just loaded Track Suit onto. I clutched the bar that connected one side to the other. Luck seemed to be with me; I could overhear the human Controller medics. 

“Three this time. There's no way this stays off _his_ radar for much longer.”

“These might be the last three. They’ve been looking for Aftran One-Eight-Nine’s host Carine all over the place since they traced all the human Controllers at the pool when that Andalite filth broke in and contaminated it. And that’s her.” 

Carine. Right. I was close.

“And the other two?”

“Iniss 206 and Sub-Visser 134. She was random bad luck; he was the one who called it in. Poor guy. Best boss I ever had, back when he was Sub-Visser 213.”

“Seriously?”

“Not like it matters now. They’ve given up on a cure.”

“I thought they found something.”

“Oh, the hosts will make it; they just need a vitamin cocktail and a T-cell booster. Half of them have already been treated, and the rest that are here are just waiting for the next batch of treatments. We won’t have bodies lying around to cover up. It doesn’t even seem to affect non-Controllers. But our people won’t make it.”

“Not that that has ever mattered to _him_.”

This was wild. I’d never heard Controllers talking like this before, so candid. They must’ve been positive that the Visser Three was completely ignorant of this situation.

“I’ll be glad when this is over. I know it takes blood contact to spread, but it still makes me nervous.”

“Pretty sure that’s why Essam 485 traded in for a Taxxon host.”

A chuckle. “I’m nervous, but not that nervous.” There was a thoughtful pause. “I’d take a Hork-Bajir for awhile, though.” The cot stopped moving, and the two medics walked away. I had no idea where I was in relation to Cassie and Rachel.

<Cassie! Rachel!> I asked in private thought-speak. <Did you hear any of that?>

<You mean the part where the humans are going to live and the Yeerks are going to die?> Rachel asked drily. <Yeah, I caught that. I say we bust this place open and let these people chow down on their fellow Controllers like they’re at a Vegas buffet.>

<It’s genocide,> Cassie said. 

<It’s war,> Rachel shot back. <If we know the humans will be okay, I say this is the Yeerks’ problem. Maybe they’ll stop infesting humans and leave Earth.>

<We don’t know it won’t mutate again,> Cassie pointed out. <It could start affecting humans if more human Controllers get it.>

<We don’t have to decide right now. We need to find a way out of here and tell the others--> I didn’t get to finish my statement, because at that moment, there was what could only be called a ruckus coming from the far end of the warehouse. 

<Prince Jake! Cassie! Rachel! We are coming!”

<The cavalry’s here!>

Then, “ _TSSSEEEEEERRR!”_

Oh no. I could’ve smacked myself in the face if I’d had hands instead of wings. We’d been back here too long. I should’ve realized Ax, Marco, and Tobias would think something had gone wrong. They’d said they’d find another way in. <Rachel, Cassie, firepower, NOW!> I still had to demorph. All three of us did. I hoped there was room, and I tried to stay balled up as tightly as possible as my legs SPLOOOOOTED out from my seagull body. Everything else was mostly melting into my human features as I grew. It’s never pretty to watch, but after my legs finished, at least I didn’t have body parts randomly shooting out from underneath the cot. 

Now for the big guns. My skin turned orange, with black stripes shivering down and over in that familiar pattern. I tried to concentrate on the morph, but I couldn’t help overhearing the surrounding chaos.

<Damn it, I forgot just how bad this morph’s eyes are,> Marco swore. <Ax or Tobias, someone tell me which direction I need to be running!>

“ANDALITES!”

 _“HUUUUUUUROOOOOOWWWRRR!”_ I heard a clatter and a thump. Definitely Rachel, definitely tossing the cot she’d been hiding under, person-and-all. And that cot had probably landed on whoever’d yelled “Andalites!”

<Jesus, Rachel, that was fast.>

<I was already demorphed.>

<ARE YOU INSANE?!> Cassie and Tobias exploded in unison. <You could’ve been seen,> Tobias added. 

<But I wasn’t, and now I’m kicking Yeerk butt.> More clattering, and I could see legs running away from the clatter.

<Guys! You really didn’t need to bust us out. This is not how I wanted this to go. We need to get out of here.> My morph finished, I leapt out and surveyed the scene. It had been controlled chaos before, but now, at least some of the people who had been strapped into their cots were turned over and starting to free themselves. Not good. Track Suit guy--er, Sub-Visser 134--was still tied down pretty well, at least. 

<Don’t worry,” Marco said. <IKEA’s a little hard to navigate, but I made us some shortcuts on my way in. I’d say follow me, but I can’t see for crap.>

<Should we trash that lab they’re doing experiments in?> Tobias asked innocently. <Because I’m pretty sure Marco can pulverize it at least as thoroughly as he pulverized the Kitchens area of IKEA.>

<I thought that was the Shelving area.>

<NO!> came the simultaneous cry from Cassie, Rachel, and myself. 

<They have a cure for humans!>

<But not for the Yeerks!> Rachel said with glee. 

<Let’s just get out of here with as little exposure as possible. Ax, you need wings. You’re a smaller target that way. We meet up at the barn as soon as we’re sure we’re clear. Let’s maybe _not_ parade through the giant store full of innocent people who just came here to buy cheap furniture, okay?>

And that should’ve been that. But of course it wasn’t. 

In the time it had taken us to get our crap together, the Controllers who’d escaped had called in reinforcements, and they began to pour in from the entrance the ambulances had come in. Weirdly, not a single Hork-Bajir or Taxxon in sight. 

And that was when it clicked.

<Guys, they’re keeping this whole thing a secret from the Visser! They don't want a fight unless we make them fight.>

<What?>

<Why would they do that?>

<Because whatever this is, it only affects human Controllers, but it doesn’t kill them; it just kills the Yeerk infesting them.>

<That may be true for now,> Ax said, <but if this is the virus Estrid engineered, it will soon mutate.> His bird of prey morph finished as both of his eye stalks withered into nothingness.

<Still doesn’t explain why they’d keep it a secret,> Tobias said.

<No, it makes sense. The Visser doesn’t have a human host, so he can’t be infected, at least for now. Whoever figured out it was just affecting Yeerks with human hosts doesn’t want to be barbequed for messing something up, because we all know how graciously Visser Three treats underlings with bad news. So they’re covering their asses,> Marco explained. 

<Great,> Rachel said, <but right now, covering their asses is about to include Draconing ours into oblivion if we don’t do something.>

<A fight is not going to help us right now. I want us out of here. We’ll still regroup at the barn,> I said. <We’ll just have to go through the store first.>

I wish I could say we made our way through the partially demolished IKEA swiftly and with no incident. I really wish I could. 

But you know that’s not what happened. 

“MAMA, LOOK AT THAT BIG TEDDY BEAR!”

“Holy *bleep*, is that a *bleep*ing rhino?”

“Dude, I didn’t know IKEA let people bring their dogs inside! Cool!”

“Oh my sweet...Carol, did I forget to take my pills? Because I swear there’s a tiger walking through that living room.”

“...what’s that weird humming sound?”

“Damn, I didn’t realize there was a furry convention happening this weekend.”

“You’d think they’d have warned us they were going to have a circus parade. I’d have just gone on to the Marketplace if I’d realized this mess would be happening.”

"Is that guy okay? He's kind of...stumbling around."

“Is that bird carrying a cinnamon bun?”

“What the...oh my god, help! That man is biting her!”

Those were just some of the commentary we heard as we booked it out of the store. And yes, Ax did swipe a cinnamon bun, but I didn’t even have the heart to scold him for taking it. They only cost like fifty cents. 

*****

“Well that was an epic disaster,” I said as I slumped down onto a hay bale. The sun was beginning to set outside. Ax was on the nearest hay bale, in his Philip morph, slowly savoring the last of the cinnamon bun he’d swiped. “We didn’t save anyone and we partially destroyed the new IKEA.”

“It wasn’t a total disaster. We know why the Yeerks are acting weird,” said Rachel. “It’s not even terrible news.”

“I’m pretty sure ‘zombies set loose in IKEA’ qualifies as some kind of disaster,” Marco said.

<Yeah. You do realize how many people they’re going to infest to keep this quiet?> Tobias asked pointedly.

“Actually,” Cassie said as she came into the barn, “I think we’re off the hook this time.”

“Say what?” I blinked. 

“It’s all over the news. ‘Mass ergot poisoning causes hysteria, mass delusions, resulting in panic and multiple injuries at IKEA. Cinnamon buns believed to be the cause.’”

<Seriously?>

“Smart,” Marco said. “They can treat everyone they need to without committing to infesting everyone, and it even keeps their cover intact for Visser Three.”

“How the...how is this…” I trailed off. 

“Hey, Ax-man, how’s your cinnamon bun?” Marco asked.

Ax looked up almost sheepishly as he stopped licking his fingers. There was no cinnamon bun left.“Not as good as the bunzzz from Cinnabon. Na. Nananana. Bon. Bunnnn. There was no way for me to get extra frosting. But still delicious.”

I looked at our group and threw up my hands. “You know what? I’ll take the win.”

  
  



End file.
